The traditions that molded the woman that I am today are rooted in
the deep, segregated south―Mississippi. I hear my pretty mother's voice
in a youthful singsong as she chants the tongue twist of duplicate
letters that make up her birth state―M- little i, ss, little i, ss, little i, pp, little i.
I am rooted to segregation, yet I am a product of de-segregation. I am
both old world and new promise. I am both wounded and healed. I am the
leaf that grew from the extended olive branch when my beautiful
grandmother, Anna Belle Latham, uprooted her reluctant family and headed
out west in the early 1960s. When the Freedom Riders― men and women,
boys and girls, black and white― came calling, Anna Belle reached within
and then outward to find a more peaceful space, or perhaps she was simply following her soul's journey. Those freedom fighting
northerners were not welcomed, my mother told me. They were not called
to come in and unravel the package that was so nicely and so neatly
assembled in a pretty little segregated box. The shifts, and the unsettling,
my mother tells me, were not appreciated in a town where everyone knew
their place.

I am a child of the sixties and seventies―old world melding into new
promise. I was born and raised in the city of the angels, Los Angeles.
My childhood friends were Jewish, black, mixed, Chicano, Persian,
Japanese, Chinese, Korean, wealthy and poor. The mothers who visited my
elementary school class during the holiday season brought in Latke
pancakes and taught us Hanukah songs. The private parties in my high
school town near the beaches that lined the Pacific Ocean were filled
with surfers, dead heads, drug heads, sushi and a raw vegan feast that
at the time didn't have the fancy names. I am old, and I am new. I see
the pain, but I see the healing as well. Sometimes the densely packed
pain of a culture feels too heavy to move, too mired in the complicated,
complicit layers of the familiar where everyone knows their place.

This month One Woman One Voice Project features Rasib Mehmood, a
gentleman poet, a PhD scholar, a Pakistani national and the freedom
fighting face of new promise. With his lilting, deep-searching words,
Rasib stands poised to figuratively sit at the lunch counters where the
Freedom Fighters dared to peacefully stake their place. He stands poised
to begin the unraveling of the war men and women all over the world are
facing―domestic abuse and other gender-based warfare. My soul's journey is to bow in gratitude to the old while reaching toward the new. The old―the
segregation of women into stifling compounds of victimhood and men into
hallow, shame-filled pockets of denial― while the familiar, is packed too densely to see any
shards of light. The new―men and women of all nations, gay and
straight, old and young, gender-specific and not bound by masculine nor
feminine―is that reach for the mature marriage that Marion Woodman speaks of and perhaps our collective souls' journey as men and women. It is that peaceful space that my
beautiful Anna Belle found when she courageously settled in the dessert
land of promise leaving the tattered pieces of the familiar on the dusty
road behind her.

Tuesday, July 1, 2014

“Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and
listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the
truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself
and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.” --Fyodor Dostoyevsky,The Brothers KaramazovAll families have collective secrets such as shared rituals,
traditions, or practices that they do not wish to share with the world.
Siblings hold secrets from their parents, while parents may choose to
withhold some aspects of their adult lives from their children. These
are not the secrets that will be discussed here.

1. The hard conversation - A client, let’s
call him Billy, came to me because of his procrastination. I asked Billy
when it started. He told me that as a teenager he suspected that his
father was an alcoholic. Billy began avoiding his father, his friends,
and even his schoolwork. As we talked further, he revealed that he still
avoided his father. Billy now had a wife and two small sons but felt a
sense of unease when he visited his father and mother with his own
family. Billy told me that his father teased him relentlessly, which
resulted in Billy packing up his family. Billy expressed a desire for
his children to know their grandparents, yet he could not bear to be in
the presence of his father and avoided his calls.

No one in Billy's family discussed his father’s drinking. His mother
and two younger sisters all played along with the lie and laughed
uncomfortably when their father was drunk and verbally cruel. Billy
worried that he would hurt is mother and two sisters if he told the
truth about his father. Nevertheless, Billy agreed to have a hard
conversation with his dad. He told his father that he loved him very
much and wanted him to be a part of his life, but he would not visit if
he drank. Billy felt a tremendous release after speaking with his
father. As a result, he was more focused and productive at home and at
work. Billy’s honesty not only liberated him it served as an invitation
to his father and the rest of his family to heal.

2. Self-love - The emotional swastika the keeps families hidden behind secrets is the mighty monster of shame. Author Brenè Brown writes in her book, Daring Greatly, “Shame
derives its power by being unspeakable.” The more fearful Billy become
of speaking his truth, the more that monster grew in his life. Shame
tells us we deserve punishment. It tells us that we are not worthy and
to keep our shameful family deeds hidden behind the shield of our
secrets. Shame tells us we are responsible for other people and how they
feel. And the most damaging of all, shame tells us that we must not
ever tell anyone. When we are silenced, our soul self is diminished
because every aspect of our being is a piece of the Divine. Self-love is
the most powerful way toward wholeness. When we deny any aspect of the
self, we suffer. Shame cannot co-exist with self-love.

3. Banishing the false construct of “good” and “bad”
- Culture sets a value system of “good” and “bad.” Within this
construct, we judge all aspects of our humanity when our divine nature
is to accept both the shadow and light of our being. Children who
experience behaviors that are painful by the hands of a parent may numb
those painful emotions with alcohol, drugs, anger, self-sabotaging
behaviors, co-dependent relations and more in order to protect their
parent from the feared societal label of being “bad.” I encourage my
clients to reframe “good” and “bad” to “broken” and “whole.” We wouldn't
dare judge and shame our hunger. We can learn not to judge and shame
the self or those who may have hurt us. With that simple shift, we can
examine our lives and the actions of those we love without judgment and
move toward true healing as easily as we fill our empty stomachs when we
are hungry.

4. Embracing the value of our family shadow - Our shadow self is a loving barometer that directs us to pay attention to our wounded parts. Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist Carl Jung said, “To confront a person with his shadow is to show him his own light.”

Thursday, June 26, 2014

We cannot be anything less than the divine source from which we came,
and that source is pure, unabashed love. When we separate from that
boundless energy of love, we begin to feel the discord of that
separation. It may manifest in different ways in our life such as
illness, lack, depression, substance abuse, etc., but it all steams from
one thing—separation from Source. For me it manifested in unhealthy
relationships with men that simply mirrored my lack of self-love.
I can tell you exactly when I stopped loving myself. I was seven
years old. I witnessed my father brutally beating my mother. In the
dark, still hours between midnight and dawn, I heard my mother’s
screams. In a desperate attempt to save herself, she broke free from my
father and ran into my bedroom.

“Call the police, Stephanie.” She cried, before my father snatched her off her feet and carried her into another room.

Then I heard slaps and punches and ugly, profane words delivered by a
man who was so far from the Daddy I knew, so far from the love of the
Source from which he came that the alcohol inside of him ruled his
actions. I could not call the police. I was paralyzed by a fear so
devastating that I lost control of my bodily functions and wet my pajama
pants.

I blamed myself from that day on for not saving my mother. I found
ways to punish myself by attracting other broken souls to mirror my pain
in the form of unhealthy relationships that mimicked the relationship
between my mother and father.

Healing begins with loving the self and banishing blame and shame
The first act of healing began when I stopped blaming myself and
acknowledged that “shame” and “blame” were simply false constructs of my
own making that kept me from embracing the love within me. I often tell
my clients to consider reframing “right” and “wrong” to “broken” and
“whole.” Our wholeness is our connection to Source, and that connection
is established through loving the self. Loving who we are and shaming,
blaming cannot co-exist. When I began to frame my experiences in this
new way, I was able to forgive my father and all that I designated as
negative experiences in my life. I understood the purpose of those
lesson and the way those experiences brought me back to love. Love is
our divine home.

Learning to love my inner child
A deeper healing took place when I began to love the little girl
inside of me who was so afraid and so ashamed. In visualization
exercises that I now use with my clients, the lost sense of love that my
seven-year-old self experienced could be restored.

Loving the self brings us in alignment with our true purpose and in harmony with others
When I began to love myself, I opened to my gifts and my divine
purpose. All that is powerful comes to us when love is the guiding force
in our lives. We can’t help but have peaceful relationships when we
acknowledge the humanity and love within others. They will either match
our love or move away from us.

With each trial we are simply falling forward toward the divine
within us. My childhood experiences and my experiences with men were all
shards of light that created a mosaic life path to walk me home.

Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Are you fully present for your life? That may be appear to
be a trick question because so many of us never consider what it means to show up
fully for ourselves. Many of us are living our lives on autopilot. One of my clients,
a successful sales executive and single mother of three children, let’s call
her Lisa, struggled to show up fully for herself. She wanted to go back to
school to complete her undergraduate degree, but found myriad reasons for not
following through with her dreams.

1.Call Forth Your Best
Self

We are multidimensional beings with the sum of our
experiences operating simultaneously inside of us. Do you choose with intention
which aspect of yourself will be the dominant voice in our life? Are you operating
from the hurt little eight-year-old self—the self that didn’t get Mommy’s love
or daddy’s approval? Lisa related to me that she did not have the time or money
to fulfill her dreams. When we explored possibilities, Lisa told me that all
three of her children were in an expensive private elementary school, which
kept her finances tight. She also disclosed that she relied solely on the
limited availability of her mother for childcare. When we explored other
options, Lisa resisted and finally said: “I don’t ever want my children to feel
the way I did growing up. I was never supported.” It didn’t occurred to Lisa
that she was continuing the pattern she learned from her parents by failing to
support herself.

A small part of Lisa did not feel she deserved to be
supported, while another part of her knew she would thrive in her chosen career
once she obtained an undergraduate degree.Our best self is the part of us that knows we are capable,
strong, all knowing, loveable, courageous, intelligent, deserving. It is simply
a choice whether we are self-directed by the most injured part of our being or
the most powerful part of our being.

2.Establishing a Practice

In order to think with intention, we have to develop
positive practices. A meditation practice can train the brain to quiet the
rambling, negative, monkey mind thoughts that keep us stuck. Lisa was plagued
with a loop of guilty thoughts when she didn’t give her children the childhood
that she really desired for herself. I suggested to Lisa that she could give
herself that wonderful, supportive childhood now by finding a way to finance
her dream of earning her degree. The practice of mindfulness, which is simply
being fully present in every moment, helped Lisa to connect to the ordinary
moments in her home with her children. Lisa discovered that her children were
happy, felt loved, and did not need the added luxury of a private, elementary
school education. Journaling helped Lisa to document the joy she received doing
simple activities with her children like riding bikes in the park, which helped
to dissolve her guilt about not being a good enough single mother.

3.Stop Living in the
“But”

Most of us have our eyes trained on the past. We are programmed
to accentuate our failures and wounds.I really want love, but my last
lover betrayed me, or I really want
that job, butI don’t have the right
credentials. A psychologist friend of mine told me she is trained to hone in
on what comes after the but when her
clients speak to her because that’s where they are living. Are you living in
the but? Do you wish for a future of
your dreams by remaining tethered to a past that delivered disappointments? Lisa
discovered that she was living in the but
and wanted out. She is now enrolled in college, placed her children in public
school, and used the money she saved to hire a part-time nanny and fully
finance her education. Lisa is happy, even eager, to invest her money, time,
and best efforts in her most precious asset—herself.

Sunday, May 25, 2014

"... like a
forgotten fire, a childhood can always flare up again within us. " ~ Gaston Bachelard

How many of us
married either a slightly different version or the stark opposite of our mothers, fathers, or other primary
care giver whom we have unresolved business? How many of us created similar
situations in our adult life that existed within our family dynamic? If no one
spoke truthfully in our family, does our intimate partnership mirror the same behavior?

I attracted a relationship that mirrored
my unresolved childhood issues. In that relationship, I re-engaged with my 4 year old self, my 8 year old
self, my defiant teen (that happened during the separation), and finally,
finally, finally grew up my little girl and LET GO of my pain, shame, brokenness
and everything else that no longer served me. Taking full responsibility was the first and crucial step.

1.Acknowledging
Our Part - The Silenced Inner Child Finally Speaks

Intimate relationships often provide an elaborate hiding place. We often attract either similar or opposite experiences within our adult relationships that mimic, in some way, our childhood experiences. If we
are afraid of experiencing our feelings, finding an intimate partner who does
all of the emoting for us can keep our fear hidden. Perhaps we are afraid of
taking care of ourselves financially or emotionally and thus create situations
wherein we are always caring for others or are over-caring for our partner who pays the bills. Perhaps we don't believe we deserve love.Finding a physically,
verbally or otherwise abusive partner will solve our need to hide from that belief, too. Acknowledging that we have called forth the relationships that we
may deem harmful is an empowering act. Taking responsibility empowers us to call forth our deepest
desire to heal and engage in our dreams. Healing begins when we begin a dialogue with our silenced inner childand acknowledge his or her pain.

2.Expanding
Our Stories - Hearing Our Inner ChildThis is the step where most people get stuck
because their stories lack fluidity. If we insist on keeping our gaze on the
relationship we called forth by replaying the abusive spouse tape or the
cheating spouse tape or whatever tape that we play to keep ourselves tethered to one aspect of our story, we fail to see the way our story wants to grow. Our
stories can grow beyond a singular painful act by healing the original pain. By
listening to the brilliant child who called forth an opportunity for our adult
self to see their pain, we finally begin to heal. Our inner child may be
begging us to speak up for ourselves, or step into our gifts, or let go of irrational fears, or some other instruction that was not possible for our child to accomplish during the
growing up years. Psychotherapist Alice Millerrefers to our inner child as our
"true self."When we hear and
heed the wisdom of our "true self," the chains of our suffering are
broken.

3.Embracing
Ourselves and the Other - Growing Up Our Inner ChildOnce we grace our stories with an opportunity to grow, we see the perfection of our
choices. We see how we called forth an opportunity for healing through our current
relationships. The vantage of seeing the greater truth of our choices gives us the space to not only forgive ourselves
and the other we called forth, but to celebrate the brilliant way the human
psyche fosters healing.

4.Falling
Into Place - Our Inner Child Finds Joy

Until I took ownership of what needed healing within me, I could not
find it in my heart to really understand the edifice of my suffering. Blaming
the very relationship that I called forth to find healing kept my attention
outside of my needs and created its own prison. The emotional house that the
broken child needed repaired came into view when I took a deeper look. Finally
seeing what was needed gave me the courage to take responsibility for my
choices, do the work required to heal my child, and then the miracle―everything fell into place. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, "It is a happy talent to know how to
play." When my work was done and the child inside of me was happy,
healthy and healed, I once again could begin to dream, and with sheer spirited abandon engaged in play.

Wednesday, May 21, 2014

"I must be
willing to give up what I am in order to become what I will be."―Albert Einstein

Have you ever stood
in the blinding light of self-righteousness?Perhaps your Republican neighbor is the devil, your boss Hitler, and
your cheating spouse the dirt beneath your feet. I certainly have had those
feelings. When I marched as a teen to end apartheid in front Shell gas
stations, there was no telling me that the Shell Company's decision not
to divest from troubled South Africa at the height of the abolish apartheid movement was nothing more than unadulterated greed. When I found out that an
ex-partner had been having affairs, he was lower than low and deserved to be
punished. What I failed to see was how my stanch positions caused me to suffer
and stifled a beautiful opportunity to grow.

When we fail to see
ourselves in the other, we suffer.If we refuse to see the humanity in another,
even our enemy, we fail to have compassion for ourselves. Nelson Mandela said
that "Our human compassion binds us the one to the other―not in pity or
patronizingly, but as human beings who have learnt how to turn our common
suffering into hope for the future." When we insist on being right, there
is no space to move forward. If one is cloaking the fullness of another in any
way, they are cloaking the fullness in themselves as well.

Yesterday I had the
pleasure, while volunteering at a polling station to help a dear friend running
for a state office, of seeing two people on opposite sides of the political
divide come together and have a colorful, thoughtful, and informative
conversation. They listened.They
considered.They acknowledged fully the
humanity of the other and found, on several occasions, not only common ground,
but a shift in their position.

What are we denying
when we eliminate the possibility of being wrong? The need to be right is like wearing
an emotional suit of amour. Strong emotions often awaken old wounds that need
healing. When I experienced a partner who had sex outside of our relationship,
it brought back the abandoned little girl who missed her father. My failed
adult relationship was really a gift that offered awareness and an invitation
to heal that long-standing wound. My strong advocacy for others as a teen gave
rise to my often ignored need to advocate for myself. We call forth
relationships to mirror what requires healing within. Our obdurate positions
are often a cry from within to attend to our unfinished emotional business.
When we fail to examine our actions, we deny the gifts they bestow.

Responsibility
without judging the self is the key. When we insist on being right, we take no responsibility
for our personal history and how we may have formed our thought patterns. We
turn a deaf ear to the other we hold as "wrong," and cut off and
strangle the most fundamental parts of our being―love and compassion. We often
do this because we judge our actions. By rendering them "right" or
"wrong," we find it too painful to visit the "wrong" parts
within us, which are merely our wounded parts. Healing can be as simple as
choosing to move, as Nelson Mandela said, toward "hope for the
future." By opening our hearts to our wounds, we embrace the
opportunity to grow, expand, and recognize our humanity and the humanity of
others.

Thursday, May 8, 2014

I veer away from politics. It is my self-imposed third rail.
Personal growth, self-empowerment, and becoming self-aware can get lost in the
body politic because of its divisiveness, inflexible structure, and suspicious
nature. But as I fought to go back to sleep at 3:30 this morning, President Obama’s infamous quote during his first campaign played a continuous loop in my
head:

“You go into some of these small
towns in Pennsylvania, Ohio—like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs
have been gone now for 25 years, and nothing's replaced them. …So it's not
surprising then that they get bitter, and they cling to guns or religion, or
antipathy toward people who aren't like them, or anti-immigrant sentiment, or,
you know, anti-trade sentiment [as] a way to explain their frustrations.”

The ensuing debate will not be
discussed here. However, why and what we cling to when we feel broken will. We
attract where we are emotionally, and where we are emotionally is the sum of our
life experiences.

President Obama’s quote put me in mind of what I clung to
during my marriage. While there was love and endearing moments, I held on to
the parts of my marriage that were filled with rage, immobilizing and castigating
words, and sometimes-violent actions.That became my supreme focus. I held
those moments almost dearly to my heart, enveloped them into my very being, and
let those moments become the very essence of who I was.Why? It was where I found comfort. Those
actions were the actions of my father, the man who terrorized my mother, me,
and my two sisters with the unpredictable and raging actions of a drunk. It is
no wonder I attracted a mate to replicate some parts of my childhood experience
because that was the space where I craved love and healing.

We attract what will heal us.We are not seeking to cause ourselves harm; we are seeking
to understand. To re-frame what may be deemed as disastrous into a sublime
opportunity is the true nature of our choice if we are open to healing. Our
soul desires to grow and thus the repetitive act of re-engaging in
what caused us pain in different forms provides us unlimited opportunities to
move beyond that pain. The continuous loop will never cease if we fail to heed the opportunity to heal and grow. We will engage in the same types of relationships, compulsive behaviors, and self-sabotaging impulses.

To look deeply at ourselves and have compassion for the other is the only way to move
forward. What do I cling to, and how is this an opportunity to become whole? That is
the liberating question and catalyst toward the process of healing.Dire circumstances and binding
relationships simply exists to remind us how to return to who we really
are—loving, caring, whole, creative, curious, wondrous beings.

About Me

I am the founder of OneWomanOneVoiceProject.com, a social networking website and positive place on the Internet to connect, grow and thrive.
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